India’s proactive Act East policy hinges heavily on the ASEAN free trade group and it is the many emerging economies in this collective that offer growth opportunities for Indian companies.

The Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) comprises of the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam. India’s focus on a strengthened and multi-faceted relationship with ASEAN was reinvigorated at the 12th ASEAN India Summit in Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar, in November 2014, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi formally flagged up the Act East Policy.

Nirmala Sitharaman, India’s commerce minister, maintains a punishing 14-15 hour daily work schedule. Over the last two years, she has been in the thick of the action and has earned a reputation for being a tough task master and a committed reformer.

The frayed nerves have calmed; the markets have stabilised; and investor attention has turned from the fallout of Brexit to the flight path of the Monsoon clouds over India and the fairly good probability of the long awaited GST Bill finally going through the Rajya Sabha and becoming law.

More than a month after the unexpected vote in favour of Brexit, economists, analysts and policy planners are unanimous that that Britain’s shock decision to exit from the European Union (EU) is unlikely to cause any major long-term damage to the Indian economy as it is still very dependent on domestic consumption, which is mostly insulated from global even.

India’s banking chief Raghuram Rajan is recognised worldwide among a handful of those who had foreseen risks in the system before the 2008 financial crisis. As governor of Reserve Bank of India (RBI), he has become a leading voice for the developing world in international fora. During a recent visit to the UK, he articulated his traffic signal model to move the world towards a more responsible monetary policy.